Happy New Year! How has everyone been doing? It’s been a long time since Hochiak! Delicious Asian Food was updated and I’ve received many emails wondering what I’ve been up to. Well, I’m doing fine and the cooking hasn’t stopped albeit, very much of the same old recipes recycling every other week. My family has also been blessed with a domestic helper from the Philipines who is very talented in cooking as she has been able to pick up Chinese cooking really fast. So, it’s been good to be having nourishing home-cooked food every evening when we return home from work.

So, what’s this cookbook that I have featured here on this post, you may ask. It’s something really exciting that I want to share with you. Hochiak! Delicious Asian Food was written based on my passion to record down everyday home-cooked food recipes to be shared with people all around the world and it has brought me tremendous pleasure and satisfaction to see many of you successfully replicating or even improvising on the recipes. Likewise, the Legacy cookbook is was written by 37 contributors, mostly home-makers and produced with the aim of ensuring that these favourite home-cooked food recipes are not forgotten. Read the rest of this entry »

Van Houten Chocolate cake, anyone? If you are looking for a tried and tested recipe for chocolate cake, you might want to try this out. This chocolate cake recipe is actually modified from the scroll cake recipe. Medium moist, light and buttery, it makes you want to have another piece once you’ve eaten one. Van Houten Cocoa Powder is used in this recipe. If you can’t find it, you might also want to try the Tudor brand. As for butter, we use Golden Churn brand. SCS butter is also a good substitute.

To prevent sticking, ensure that the baking pan is well greased with butter followed by dusting with flour. Cool the cake over a rack before storing.

Oh, in case you were wondering, the Van Houten Chocolate Cake is on the foreground. The other pieces of cakes are the famous Sarawak Layer Cake (Kuih Lapis Sarawak). Looks good, don’t they?

One of the earliest dishes I tried out at Japanese restaurants was the Chicken Teriyaki. Lightly grilled and basted with the mildly sweet teriyaki sauce, the tender pieces of chicken always go well with steamed rice. Though I’ve seen the teriyaki marinade being sold at the supermarket shelves, I never got around to buying them until a few months ago – now that I have an oven at home.

I never knew that it was so easy to prepare a dish of oven-roasted chicken teriyaki to perfection but that would be a recipe for another day to share with you. For today, let me share with you what I attempted for the first time which resulted in a thumbs up from my wife 😀

Stir-fried boneless chicken with capsicums in teriyaki sauce may be a long name to pronounce but definitely short and easy to cook. Ingredients are simple and cooking time is minimal. I do think that this dish would be better if a couple of slices of onion are included but you won’t be disappointed even if you don’t have it. The capsicums themselves will give a slight robust taste to this dish, not to mention, a crunch to the otherwise tender pieces of chicken.

For the chicken, I chose the whole leg of chicken, completely deboned with skin removed. Breast meat may not be suitable as it is less tender. The skin is removed so that the dish will turn out less oily. Moreover, it would not be suitable to stir fry the chicken with meat intact. If you prefer to have the chicken skin on, roasting would be a better option. I never knew chicken teriyaki was so simple, and this recipe could even withstand the toughest restaurant reviews – it’s that delicious 😉

Scallop Congee is one of my most oft cooked congee for weekend lunch. Okay, make it Scallop Porridge for those who are more familiar with the word porridge. Actually, it’s the same. And whichever name you call it, it will still taste as good though I suspect the word “congee” sounds much more sophisticated and refined to be used.

For this congee, I use dried scallops which I purchase from the wet market. You can get them from supermarkets and some chinese herbal shops or even, dried sea produce. I use those which are relatively small in size – perhaps about the size of half a pop corn as they are cheap and easy to cook.

In the picture above, the scallop congee appears white in colour. I have a habit of eating my scallop congee with an egg. What I would do is to break an egg into the bowl and pour boiling congee over it before giving it a good stir. The egg gives the congee a much smoother texture and definitely tastes better. Game for a bowl? 🙂

My Daily Bread

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. (Galatians 5:16-17, ESV)